


Overflow

by lawless



Series: Unnatural Disasters [2]
Category: Gravitation
Genre: Community: 30_kisses, Drama, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-07-06
Updated: 2009-07-06
Packaged: 2017-10-10 14:44:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/100906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lawless/pseuds/lawless
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eiri and Shuichi meet their downstairs neighbor, Granny Otoomo, as a result of a mishap in their apartment.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Oveflow

**Author's Note:**

> Written for LiveJournal's 30_kisses writing challenge community. Theme: #27, overflow
> 
> Set several years post-anime and post-manga (including EX) at a point by which Shuichi calls Eiri by his first name, the abandoned cat that Shuichi rescues in my story "Stray" (also part of my 30_kisses series of stories) is now full grown, and Eiri has mellowed.
> 
> Beta review by HawkClowd.

**Rating/Warnings:** Rated M for language, adult concepts, and nudity.  
**Disclaimer:** Maki Murakami, Gentosha, TokyoPop and RightStuf own the rights to Gravitation and profit from it, not me. The crafty Granny Otoomo is my creation, though.  


It all started with Shuichi falling asleep.

Well, maybe it started with a bath.

He was so tired.

Eiri had kept him up unreasonably late the night before. Where the hell did he get all that energy from? It wasn't like Eiri hadn't been busy or was coming off one of those two or three day stints of rest and respite that occurred when he'd finished work on a manuscript. Somehow, no matter how disciplined he tried to be with his writing, he was always under the gun as a deadline approached. He wound up acting like a college student who needed to pull all-nighters to finish a paper on time, and he paid for it afterward with exhaustion and collapse.

Although Shuichi was unable to resist Eiri no matter how much he had resolved to, this time he really had wanted to go to sleep after the first round. At Sakano's request, K had kept them in the studio at gunpoint until early morning for the past two weeks. When had Sakano, of all people, grown a pair? Then again Shuichi had heard rumors about Sakano and Tohma palling around behind Mika's back. Maybe the long hours were Tohma's idea. Or perhaps messing around with Tohma had cured some of Sakano's neuroses and stiffened Sakano's resolve.

Whatever the reason, the bottom line was that Shuichi was a tired puppy. He had arrived home looking forward to a home-cooked meal, a warm bath, and pleasant dreams. He expected hot sex to be on the agenda too, but not such acrobatic sex, nor for such an extended period.

Getting so sweaty between the sheets had gotten him literally sweaty, so when that pesky cat Momo woke him up demanding to be fed, he showered in preparation for a bath after feeding her. While running water for his bath, he reflected that it was a drag to be the lighter sleeper of the two of them when the cat's tummy alarm went off. Breakfast finished and wanting to check on the silly human who had rescued her, the cat padded into the bathroom and curled up on the fuzzy bathmat to which her loose fur stuck like Velcro.

"Shu! Shu!"

He was swimming in the ocean – no, he was relaxing in an _onsen _with a frog, a _kami_ and a samurai. Who was calling his name? Wait – wasn't that Eiri's voice?

He started and woke up, legs flailing. Well, he _was_ surrounded by water…

…which had spilled over the side of the tub, flooding the bathroom floor.

He looked around frantically for the cat. She hated baths. Wouldn't she have let out a howl if the water reached her?

Before he saw the cat, though, Eiri's face appeared upside down and close to his. Eiri was bending over him…turning off the faucet…

Oh shit. The bath water had relaxed him so much he'd fallen asleep and forgotten to turn the water off.

He spotted the cat. She had climbed the shelves where they kept the towels, in the process knocking off a clean towel that was now soaked. He was relieved that she was okay and had not gotten wet, although as a result of keeping him company she was trapped in the bathroom. Her yellow eyes glowed as she looked down at them from her perch on the top shelf, hunched over like a feline vulture.

Eiri frantically pulled towels down from the shelf and threw them on the floor to try to absorb the water that was sloshing all over the tile. Shuichi couldn't find the energy to get out of the tub even though he knew he should help Eiri clean up the mess he'd made.

Eiri's hands pulled him up and out of the water carefully while holding onto him tightly. Arms strengthened by hours of typing dragged him over the side of the tub until he slid onto the floor in a sodden heap.

The same hands wrapped a towel around him, patting his skin and hair dry, while Eiri held him upright.

When he finally looked up, he saw Eiri's brows furrow with concern while the rest of his face was fixed in a scowl. He continued to maintain an uncharacteristic silence. The floor was still slippery, the cat still needed to be rescued, and he'd used up nearly all of the clean towels. Maybe he was afraid of what he might say or how Shuichi would react to it.

As he continued to prop Shuichi up, the telephone began ringing shrilly. He left Shuichi leaning against the side of the tub and gingerly stepped out of the sodden bathroom. He couldn't walk any faster when he got to the hallway either because his feet were still slippery from the standing water.

Shuichi heard him say "Yes?" impatiently. "Uh huh. Yes. Okay. I'll visit her once I've got things under control up here. The water in the bathtub overflowed—No, it wasn't me. It was my idiot roommate."

Shuichi realized that he must be speaking to the building superintendent. Eiri continued to maintain the pretense that Shuichi was his roommate for purposes of the apartment, which Eiri owned. As far as building management knew officially, Shuichi rented space from Eiri. Since the apartment had two bedrooms, this wasn't completely implausible if you didn't know who the two of them were or paid no attention to celebrity news.

Eiri hung up and returned to the bathroom. Shuichi was more or less sitting up on his own now, so Eiri turned his attention to rescuing the cat and mopping up what remained of the flood waters.

Once he had retrieved Momo so she was once more able to stalk pretend mice and console herself with tidbits from her food bowl and cat treats Eiri put out for her, Eiri mopped and squeezed water out of the mop into the sink until there was no more standing water except that which Shuichi was sitting in. He was still so out of it he hardly even flinched when the mop hit him by accident.

Now that he was finished with the other aspects of the cleanup, Eiri turned his attention to rousing Shuichi enough to get him to stand up. Usually he would have plenty of ideas as to how to do this and no qualms about using them but he knew Shuichi must have been exhausted to the point of stupor to fall asleep the way he did. Doing something like pinching his butt would be cruel under the circumstances.

Instead Eiri held Shuichi around the shoulders and tried pulling him up. Shuichi just flopped around, so Eiri tried talking to him first. "C'mon, Shuichi, you need to get up now so I can finish drying the floor," he said. Then he wrapped his arms around Shuichi's waist and pulled up.

This seemed to work better; with some difficulty he got Shuichi to his feet, although he wasn't well-balanced and staggered a few times before steadying himself. Eiri continued to hold him until it felt like he could stand on his own.

A slow trickle of tears began running down Shuichi's face after Eiri let go. He took in a halting breath and choked out, "I'm so sorry, Eiri. I didn't mean to fall asleep with the water running!"

"I know you didn't."

"Are you angry about it?"

"No – well, yes, I'm angry, but more about how much work it's going to be to fix things. Enough water soaked through that it's dripping into the apartment underneath this one. That's what the phone call was about. I've got to go see the woman who lives in that apartment about repairing the damage."

"I should pay for it."

"I was going to ask you to. But since the apartment's in my name, legally it's my responsibility, so I'll pay for it and you reimburse me, okay?"

"Sure." Shuichi thought Eiri was being unusually agreeable about this.

"Of course," Eiri added with a wicked glint in his eyes, "your reimbursement won't be limited to the amount of money I have to shell out to fix her apartment and ours. I may insist on some _other_ forms of compensation as well."

Shuichi was almost afraid to ask, or even think about, what Eiri would consider an appropriate form of compensation other than money. "Like what?"

Eiri smirked. "Oh, I'm sure I can think of something interesting."

Shuichi shivered. He wasn't sure whether to be excited or scared about the hold Eiri now had over him.


	2. Oveflow

**Rating/Warnings:** Rated M for language, adult concepts, and nudity.  
**Disclaimer:** Maki Murakami, Gentosha, TokyoPop and RightStuf own the rights to Gravitation and profit from it, not me. The crafty Granny Otoomo is my creation, though.  


It all started with Shuichi falling asleep.

Well, maybe it started with a bath.

He was so tired.

Eiri had kept him up unreasonably late the night before. Where the hell did he get all that energy from? It wasn't like Eiri hadn't been busy or was coming off one of those two or three day stints of rest and respite that occurred when he'd finished work on a manuscript. Somehow, no matter how disciplined he tried to be with his writing, he was always under the gun as a deadline approached. He wound up acting like a college student who needed to pull all-nighters to finish a paper on time, and he paid for it afterward with exhaustion and collapse.

Although Shuichi was unable to resist Eiri no matter how much he had resolved to, this time he really had wanted to go to sleep after the first round. At Sakano's request, K had kept them in the studio at gunpoint until early morning for the past two weeks. When had Sakano, of all people, grown a pair? Then again Shuichi had heard rumors about Sakano and Tohma palling around behind Mika's back. Maybe the long hours were Tohma's idea. Or perhaps messing around with Tohma had cured some of Sakano's neuroses and stiffened Sakano's resolve.

Whatever the reason, the bottom line was that Shuichi was a tired puppy. He had arrived home looking forward to a home-cooked meal, a warm bath, and pleasant dreams. He expected hot sex to be on the agenda too, but not such acrobatic sex, nor for such an extended period.

Getting so sweaty between the sheets had gotten him literally sweaty, so when that pesky cat Momo woke him up demanding to be fed, he showered in preparation for a bath after feeding her. While running water for his bath, he reflected that it was a drag to be the lighter sleeper of the two of them when the cat's tummy alarm went off. Breakfast finished and wanting to check on the silly human who had rescued her, the cat padded into the bathroom and curled up on the fuzzy bathmat to which her loose fur stuck like Velcro.

"Shu! Shu!"

He was swimming in the ocean – no, he was relaxing in an _onsen _with a frog, a _kami_ and a samurai. Who was calling his name? Wait – wasn't that Eiri's voice?

He started and woke up, legs flailing. Well, he _was_ surrounded by water…

…which had spilled over the side of the tub, flooding the bathroom floor.

He looked around frantically for the cat. She hated baths. Wouldn't she have let out a howl if the water reached her?

Before he saw the cat, though, Eiri's face appeared upside down and close to his. Eiri was bending over him…turning off the faucet…

Oh shit. The bath water had relaxed him so much he'd fallen asleep and forgotten to turn the water off.

He spotted the cat. She had climbed the shelves where they kept the towels, in the process knocking off a clean towel that was now soaked. He was relieved that she was okay and had not gotten wet, although as a result of keeping him company she was trapped in the bathroom. Her yellow eyes glowed as she looked down at them from her perch on the top shelf, hunched over like a feline vulture.

Eiri frantically pulled towels down from the shelf and threw them on the floor to try to absorb the water that was sloshing all over the tile. Shuichi couldn't find the energy to get out of the tub even though he knew he should help Eiri clean up the mess he'd made.

Eiri's hands pulled him up and out of the water carefully while holding onto him tightly. Arms strengthened by hours of typing dragged him over the side of the tub until he slid onto the floor in a sodden heap.

The same hands wrapped a towel around him, patting his skin and hair dry, while Eiri held him upright.

When he finally looked up, he saw Eiri's brows furrow with concern while the rest of his face was fixed in a scowl. He continued to maintain an uncharacteristic silence. The floor was still slippery, the cat still needed to be rescued, and he'd used up nearly all of the clean towels. Maybe he was afraid of what he might say or how Shuichi would react to it.

As he continued to prop Shuichi up, the telephone began ringing shrilly. He left Shuichi leaning against the side of the tub and gingerly stepped out of the sodden bathroom. He couldn't walk any faster when he got to the hallway either because his feet were still slippery from the standing water.

Shuichi heard him say "Yes?" impatiently. "Uh huh. Yes. Okay. I'll visit her once I've got things under control up here. The water in the bathtub overflowed—No, it wasn't me. It was my idiot roommate."

Shuichi realized that he must be speaking to the building superintendent. Eiri continued to maintain the pretense that Shuichi was his roommate for purposes of the apartment, which Eiri owned. As far as building management knew officially, Shuichi rented space from Eiri. Since the apartment had two bedrooms, this wasn't completely implausible if you didn't know who the two of them were or paid no attention to celebrity news.

Eiri hung up and returned to the bathroom. Shuichi was more or less sitting up on his own now, so Eiri turned his attention to rescuing the cat and mopping up what remained of the flood waters.

Once he had retrieved Momo so she was once more able to stalk pretend mice and console herself with tidbits from her food bowl and cat treats Eiri put out for her, Eiri mopped and squeezed water out of the mop into the sink until there was no more standing water except that which Shuichi was sitting in. He was still so out of it he hardly even flinched when the mop hit him by accident.

Now that he was finished with the other aspects of the cleanup, Eiri turned his attention to rousing Shuichi enough to get him to stand up. Usually he would have plenty of ideas as to how to do this and no qualms about using them but he knew Shuichi must have been exhausted to the point of stupor to fall asleep the way he did. Doing something like pinching his butt would be cruel under the circumstances.

Instead Eiri held Shuichi around the shoulders and tried pulling him up. Shuichi just flopped around, so Eiri tried talking to him first. "C'mon, Shuichi, you need to get up now so I can finish drying the floor," he said. Then he wrapped his arms around Shuichi's waist and pulled up.

This seemed to work better; with some difficulty he got Shuichi to his feet, although he wasn't well-balanced and staggered a few times before steadying himself. Eiri continued to hold him until it felt like he could stand on his own.

A slow trickle of tears began running down Shuichi's face after Eiri let go. He took in a halting breath and choked out, "I'm so sorry, Eiri. I didn't mean to fall asleep with the water running!"

"I know you didn't."

"Are you angry about it?"

"No – well, yes, I'm angry, but more about how much work it's going to be to fix things. Enough water soaked through that it's dripping into the apartment underneath this one. That's what the phone call was about. I've got to go see the woman who lives in that apartment about repairing the damage."

"I should pay for it."

"I was going to ask you to. But since the apartment's in my name, legally it's my responsibility, so I'll pay for it and you reimburse me, okay?"

"Sure." Shuichi thought Eiri was being unusually agreeable about this.

"Of course," Eiri added with a wicked glint in his eyes, "your reimbursement won't be limited to the amount of money I have to shell out to fix her apartment and ours. I may insist on some _other_ forms of compensation as well."

Shuichi was almost afraid to ask, or even think about, what Eiri would consider an appropriate form of compensation other than money. "Like what?"

Eiri smirked. "Oh, I'm sure I can think of something interesting."

Shuichi shivered. He wasn't sure whether to be excited or scared about the hold Eiri now had over him.


	3. Epilogue

Shuichi bent over the coffee table dressed in a scandalously short French maid's outfit, cap and all, flicking a feather duster at the table. Eiri sat on the couch watching him, taking pictures, and touching himself. Shuichi thought about Eiri's creative ways of making him pay for letting the tub overflow. The absence of underwear was hindering his completion of the tasks Eiri had set out for him but was helping stiffen his resolve.

Eiri reached out to touch his lover and smiled, satisfied that the compensation he had arranged met his objectives. While Shuichi would probably have agreed to these things even without having something held over his head, it was more fun this way. All Eiri had to do was make it clear that this one favor wasn't going to be enough to compensate him for his time and trouble cleaning up and fixing the bathroom. More would be required.

/fin/

Glossary:

_onsen_ – hot springs  
_kami - _spirit  
_mochi_ – cake made from pounded glutinous rice  
_daifuku_ – _mochi_ with a sweet filling  
_Kaasan_ \- Mother

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have jumped ahead some in my description of Momo the cat. I plan on writing a follow up to "Stray" describing her first visit to the vet, how she got her name (I've let that cat out of the bag already, I'm afraid, but it'll explain why), her getting fixed and why, and the secret of her changing eye color that will require traveling back in time from what's described here.
> 
> Much love to my beta HawkClowd and a big thank you to Aja for culinary and linguistic suggestions.


End file.
